


to forgive

by GeekintheCorner



Category: Batman - All Media Types, Nightwing (Comics), Red Robin (Comics)
Genre: Brotherly Angst, Dick Grayson Needs a Hug, Gen, Hurt Dick Grayson, Hurt No Comfort, No Romance, No Slash, Tim Drake Has Issues, Tim Drake Needs a Hug, Whumptober, and some, deals with the whole spyral thing but also i havent read those and tim might be slightly ooc, more emotional whump/angst in this one though, no creepy shipping here yall, they all do, they don't get any :/, we got some
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-01
Updated: 2020-10-01
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:35:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,053
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26751436
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GeekintheCorner/pseuds/GeekintheCorner
Summary: Dick turns on his heel to head towards the changing rooms but stops about halfway there. “Tim?”“Let’s hang out sometime yeah?”Tim’s mouth thins and his chair spins back around to face whatever case he’s working on now.
Relationships: Dick Grayson & Jason Todd, Tim Drake & Dick Grayson
Comments: 5
Kudos: 134
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	to forgive

**Author's Note:**

> My first Whumptober prompt ever!! And I use three from two different pages oop- For Whumptober2020's "Let's hang out sometime" and Whumtober-2020's bruises, and "stay with me." 
> 
> This is entirely platonic, in no way is it not, leave if you want to read it as otherwise. 
> 
> No characters here belong to me, all rights to DC.

“Hey Tim!” Dick waves toward his little brother as he enters the Batcave to get ready for tonight’s patrol.

Things have been… tense between them since Dick had come back from the ‘dead’ a few months prior. Sure Tim had said he had forgiven him (only after Jason had and Dick refuses to believe that the only reason Tim had followed suit was because Jason or Bruce had talked him into it), but their relationship hadn’t been the same since. Every time Dick asked him to watch a movie, or go out, or even to patrol together, Tim would say no. Without fail. Dick couldn’t blame him, what he had done was awful and wrong and unforgivable and he would never get back what he had had to give up, but it still hurt whenever his second youngest brother left the room just because he entered it. 

Tim doesn’t turn from where he’s sitting at the Batcomputer. “Hey Dick.” His tone is perfectly civil. Perfectly neutral. Dick tries not to let it bother him.

“Just you, me, Steph, and Jason out tonight.” Dick keeps his tone upbeat while he walks closer to the computer.

“I know.” Tim rolls his eyes. “Everyone else is literally out of the country.”

Dick’s well placed smile doesn’t falter. “I’ve already got Jason to agree to post-patrol snacks, at that one diner downtown, the one with the curly fries. I was wondering if maybe you’d want to invite Steph and-” 

“I’ve got plans already.”

Dick’s grin falters. “Oh yeah?”

Tim cuts his eyes towards him for the first time. “With Steph.”

A pause.

“Right. You guys have fun then.” Dick turns on his heel to head towards the changing rooms but stops about halfway there. “Tim?”

Tim turns in his seat and raises an eyebrow. D*mn he’s so much like Bruce without being anything like him.

“Let’s hang out sometime yeah?”

Tim’s mouth thins and his chair spins back around to whatever case he’s working on now.

**

Tim is lounging around on Steph’s couch when his phone rings. He hadn’t lied to Dick. They’d had plans, they just weren’t exactly non negotiable. In fact Tim is pretty sure Steph would have infinitely preferred grabbing an after-patrol milkshake to watching The Office on her couch. Again. 

A quick glance at the caller ID and Tim let's it go to voicemail. Jason is probably just calling to rag on him about skipping out on Dick. Tim had never thought he’d see the day  _ Jason  _ was the one reminding  _ him  _ to be a better brother, but here they are. 

The phone rings again almost as soon as it shuts off. Jason must be  _ pissed.  _ Maybe Dick tried to talk about Jason’s feelings again. That had been happening more frequently since the two called a truce, but it never ended well for anyone involved. 

Suddenly the ringing stops, too soon for it to have gone to voicemail. Tim’s eyes shoot open at the sound of Steph’s voice. 

“Hiya Todd.” Her eyes shift to look him in the eyes. “Just being a lazy *ss. Why?”

A few moments of silence pass in which Steph’s back straightens almost imperceptibly and her eyes narrow. 

“Jason. What is it?” That’s her Batgirl tone. The one she uses when she isn’t comforting a broken child or picking on Bruce, it’s the one she uses when she’s being  _ Bat _ girl.

Suddenly she turns on her heel to stare out the window. “No. Why? Wasn’t he supposed to meet you?”

Tim’s stomach churns. How did Steph even know that?

Steph’s jaw clenches as she listens to the other side of the line. “Have you tried-” Silence. “Okay have you checked with Oracle?” 

Tim is frozen, sitting stock still on the edge of Steph’s well loved grey couch. He isn’t stupid. He knows what’s happened. Dick is missing and not even Oracle can find him. And what was the last thing Tim said to him? Nothing. He hadn’t said anything while his older brother, that he loved so  _ so _ much, practically begged to spend time with him. And now he might never see him again. 

**

It’s Red Robin who finds him ironically. He’s lying alone on the edge of the docks, though the wreckage and blood splatters around him suggest he wasn’t knocked out without a fight. 

Tim catches sight of the striking blue against black and breaks into a run. 

“Nightwing! ‘Wing, come on.” Tim tries to keep his voice from wavering as he presses his (shaking) fingers to his brother’s neck and holds them there. His brother’s face is covered with bruises. Some shaped suspiciously like boot prints. A picture begins to form in Tim’s head and he doesn’t like it. Some- some group of thugs, or henchmen, or some other scum had decided to beat up an unconscious Nightwing and leave him to  _ die _ . Or maybe, they had thought he already was. But he- he can’t- “No, no, no. Dick come on.  _ You can’t leave us. You can’t leave me again.” _

“Red Robin. Check-in.”

Tim lets out a ragged breath. “Babs. Oracle, I- I found him. I found Nightwing”

“Is he okay?”  _ Is he alive? _

“I- I don’t-”

“Red Robin,  _ is he breathing?” _

Something snaps to attention in Tim’s head and he refocuses on the place where Dick’s pulse should be. It’s there. Lighter than it should be, but it’s clear and there. Next Tim moves his attention to his brother’s chest. Again Dick’s breathing is shallower than it should be, but it’s there. Dick is alive. 

“Tim!”

“He’s alive. Injured, but alive.”

Oracle lets out a shaky breath of her own. “I’m sending Hood and Batgirl to your position. Agent A is readying the medbay.” A pause. “He loves you Tim.” 

Tim closes his eyes. “I know.”

Oracle sighs over the comms, “Hood is approaching your location.” Then her line cuts. Tim vaguely wonders if she might be rushing her way to the cave. 

He stretches his hand out and across the rough pavement from where he’s sitting and grabs Dick’s hand, subtly placing his thumb over his pulse point. 

  
_ His brother is alive.  _ He isn’t in the ground, in an empty coffin that never held him anyway. He’s alive, and here, and  _ sorry.  _ And Tim- Tim was going to try to make it okay.

**Author's Note:**

> I know Tim was sort of OOC in this, but I just had the urge to write this and couldn't not. As always kudos and comments are greatly appreciated, thanks for reading!


End file.
